


Making Patterns on the Wall

by Highsmith (quimtessence)



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Banter, Bathroom Sex, Biting, Bottom Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Canon Queer Character of Color, Canon Queer Relationship, Character Study, Condoms, Denial of Feelings, Enemies to Lovers, Enemies with Benefits in Denial, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Making Out, Manhandling, Rough Sex, Semi-Public Sex, Snark, Sort Of, That AU Where Joe and Nicky Never Stop Trying to Kill Each Other, Top Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, Wall Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-17
Updated: 2020-10-17
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:26:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27052633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quimtessence/pseuds/Highsmith
Summary: Nicky's grin has too many teeth. "How much time do you think it'll take them to call the authorities after I shoot you? I think thirty seconds to reach the phone, maybe a minute with this crowd."Cocking his head, shoulders infinitesimally relaxing into the back of his chair, Joe taunts, "Don't be like that, love," fully knowing it might earn him, at the very least, one or more pieces of cutlery being thrown in his general direction. From this close, he could do some serious damage; they both could. Momentarily, Joe feels his lips tingling.That AU where Joe and Nicky are still lowkey trying to kill each other and, just as lowkey, are totally knocking boots on the side. As you do.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 78
Kudos: 459





	Making Patterns on the Wall

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Take Me to the Riot" by Stars.
> 
> In the same 'verse as [waste this night away with me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25397926), though both can be 100% read as standalones.

The lot of them haven't had a reason to meet in about two hundred years, but the dreams aren't going to stop anytime soon if they don't. Which is probably why, after so long he barely recognises her voice, Andy approaches him to alert him that the three of them are going on a retrieval mission. Through the crackly line, all Joe can do is wish them luck and listen to her weary sigh. He's just returned from being underground for three months, knowing someone was bound to get in touch, although he was hoping— True, the odds were low it would be— Well.

She's extending not only an invitation but an olive branch of sorts as well. But. He can't engage in this. He can't. Whatever olive branches there are, she can only speak for herself. At the very most for Quynh and Booker.

"Pass," he says. He hangs up. He waits.

The next call comes two days later. Nile Freeman, as Andy tells it, is confused but convinced. This time around, she proposes the six of them meet in a public place.

"I'm not asking," she says. And Joe has no real reason to follow orders. Seniority age-wise doesn't come into it. But she's, apparently, not done. "It's only a momentary truce. He's already said yes," she adds, sounding like she said it merely as an afterthought, a titbit of irrelevant information. They both know it's not.

And Joe glances about his safe house, wondering when he became so weak he'll take any excuse when it's been three months and two days of _nothing_.

*

Tired. Tired all the time. The part about immortality no one tells you about. The part about the marrow in your bones aching even when your bones are in pristine condition. The ache in your chest, phantom and painless, but a hurt nonetheless. Joe would even prefer the scars. Those would be tangible. There's something about feeling very human skin under your fingertips, skin which has witnessed something the rest of him hasn't. But he doesn't get that. None of them do.

He wonders how the new one will cope. Sometimes, he wonders how _he_ has.

"It's because you're weak," he whispers to himself.

He's outside the pub doors, purposefully late. If he knows anything it's that Andy won't be happy about it, but Joe isn't here to make friends. Through one of the windows he gets a clear view of their table, Andy and Quynh at either end, Booker sitting next to a young woman who, even from this distance, appears vaguely shell-shocked. There's an empty seat across from them. Next to it, unmistakably, sits Nicky, the back of his head showing he's back to that ridiculous substitute English teacher haircut he's likely given himself with the help of two mirrors and whatever scissors he could find lying around.

Part of Joe was convinced he wasn't going to show.

He goes in.

*

It's not going great. Kind of the opposite.

Nile is asking all sorts of questions Joe would've thought the others had answered two days ago, but she's doing it in such an earnest way he can't help but give her whatever answers he has, however seemingly unappealing.

"Misery loves company," he mutters, to which Nile frowns, pensive and perhaps a little disappointed. Where is his drink? Booker already has his and is smiling into it, liquid gurgling between his laugh and the glass.

To his right, almost too quietly to hear over the noise of the pub, Nicky grumbles, "It's destiny," pointedly over-articulating, jaw shifting as if he's grinding his teeth together through the words, to which Joe can't help but to turn sideways in his seat and lean back to see him fully, tensed and sharp-eyed and virtually unchanged since the last time.

"Or a complete accident," Joe quips, lip curled, eyes harder than such a statement should probably warrant.

Among sweaty bed sheets in dingy hotel rooms, they've had this conversation and so many more like it too many times to count. It usually ends in stilted words and weeks of distance. Then a blade, for tradition's sake.

Nicky's grin has too many teeth. "In quanto tempo pensi che chiameranno le autorità dopo che ti sparo? Penso che trenta secondi per raggiungere il telefono, forse un minuto con tutta questa gente."

Cocking his head, shoulders infinitesimally relaxing into the back of his chair, Joe taunts, "Non fare così, amore," fully knowing it might earn him, at the very least, one or more pieces of cutlery being thrown in his general direction. From this close, he could do some serious damage; they both could. Momentarily, Joe feels his lips tingling.

But, as Nicky is opening his mouth to retort, his left eye already twitching minutely, Andy snaps, "Behave," and Joe shows his teeth obnoxiously, eyebrows wiggling, not even making an attempt to stifle his smirk. This is familiar territory. Greatly missed, though Joe freezes his smirk lest that particular feeling overshadow the rest.

They're interrupted by a hand collecting the empty glass in front of Andy. The server moves to Joe's side of the table next.

"I ordered you a drink," Quynh tells him just as he gingerly places what looks to be a Shirley Temple right in front of Joe. Which, objectively, isn't the worst idea given how the day will likely progress. He can't help wanting something stronger, though.

Instead, he cheerily toasts Quynh, who laughs heartily. Shakes her head far too fondly. Over the rim of his glass, he watches Nile asking Booker to translate the Italian while Andy listens intently. Joe tunes them out and downs half of the glass in one big swallow, careful with the floating cherry.

It's far too sweet. When he lowers it, he finds Nicky staring at Joe's hand around the glass. He glances up at Joe's face, looking as if he's trying to think through the logistics of something. Joe taps his foot against the floor and his fingers against the glass. He straightens in his seat, although it feels less than comfortable. Booker is now telling a bad joke Nile won't get. Andy and Quynh are both motioning the server for more drinks. Nicky is listening to Booker's joke, following from set-up to punchline. It's only funny because Booker tells it well.

Low and rusty, Nicky's laugh is both a taunt and a tease to Joe's ears, hits him where he lives as precisely as a sledgehammer to the midsection. He grips the edge of the table with tight hands and manages to pull himself up without stumbling into any piece of furniture on his way around it.

Staring to the side, he points his thumb over his shoulder in a vague sort of way. "Bathroom." He doesn't wait for anyone's reaction, walking off with careful steps.

Mercifully, he passes someone exiting the bathroom, which he subsequently finds empty and unusually clean for this time of day in a crowded pub. He washes his hands, then wets his face above his beard. Lets the water dry all on its own. Idly, he wonders when the next set of dreams will come. Whether he'll be around to have them. Or, perhaps, he'll be just another story for the rest to tell, just like Lykon. At one point or another, they'll all be stories. He watches stray water drops slipping against porcelain until he can't anymore. Besides, hiding out in the bathroom is not how he wants to spend his afternoon, thank you very much.

Behind him, he spots movement, and, before he can react, he watches in the mirror as Nicky opens the door and steps inside. Joe barely manages to turn around and take a couple of steps forward before Nicky is on him, the door closing with a thud behind him. In the blink of an eye he's got his arms full.

They haven't done this in three fucking months.

Bastard bites his neck beneath his ear _hard_. A dull hurt which disappears in under a minute, no blood as far as Joe can tell, but it has the desired effect of Joe's cock twitching in his jeans, half-hard within _seconds_. When Nicky extracts his face from his neck, Joe finds himself biting him back, only he ends up with Nicky's lower lip between his teeth. Nicky's mouth is hot and opens willingly for his tongue. Joe doesn't know when he swivelled them around to crowd him against the nearest sink or when he closed his eyes, but all of these things have decidedly occurred, and Joe certainly isn't willing to take his mouth away to investigate the space-time continuum, not until after he's had his fill.

In the meantime, Nicky has somehow managed to strip Joe of his leather jacket to let it messily fall to the ground and is doing a decent job of rucking Joe's shirt up his chest with one hand while the other has found its way down the back of Joe's jeans, underneath his underwear, and is confidently circling his hole with one dry finger. Pushing against it, hips canted back, he squeezes at Nicky's sides, licks at the roof of his mouth and behind his teeth, presses their thighs together.

When Nicky's hand has had enough of groping at his chest, he lets it drop down, fingers trailing the muscles from solar plexus to navel. Joe covers his palm with his to slide it down to press and cup Nicky's cock through the front of his jeans. He's very hard, and Joe blinks desperately and swallows heavily so he doesn't drool for it. When was the last time he sucked him? Fuck, it feels like _ages_.

However, dropping to his knees here is perhaps a tad inconvenient. As Nicky extracts his hand from the back of his trousers and moves his mouth away, Joe considers their options. Apparently, Nicky has already done a fair bit of consideration of his own. Drags him by the face inside the farthest stall from the door, kicks the door closed before flipping the latch, and proceeds to try to take both his clothes and Joe's off at the same time.

Panting embarrassingly heavily, Joe takes a step back. Instead of following, Nicky leans back almost languorously, obviously showing off, his jeans half-off and his cock tenting his underwear, wetting it where the tip is poking insistently at the fabric. His lips curl at the corners.

From personal experience he knows Nicky has the uncanny ability to look smug, whether with his mouth stuffed full of cock or bloodied up from Joe's blade. Already, his mouth is swollen from Joe's teeth; it would be _easy_ to wreck it further.

But, before Joe's line of thinking can become reality, he's kicking off his shoes and wiggling out of his jeans, pulling Joe close by his necklace right into his mouth, and thoughts of putting him on his knees get replaced with much more practical notions, such as whether Nicky has lube on him.

Turns out, he does. He takes out a small tube from his pocket and hands it to Joe, who, while Nicky's busy stepping out of his underwear and shoving it into the leg of his jeans, manages to slick two fingers and rub them together to warm it up some. Vaguely, he watches Nicky, now in just his socks and shirt, start to turn around, and something about the gesture gives him pause, but it's only for an instant. He stops him with a hand at his hip bone, eyes searching.

Clearly annoyed, though still flushed and dark-eyed, Nicky says, "What," less a question than a bark, and Joe gulps and says, "Like this."

To his surprise, Nicky only blinks once before leaning against the door and parting his legs. Joe steps between them and reaches forward, knuckling at his taint before his fingers find his rim, circling it once before he prods at it insistently. He buries his face in the space between neck and shoulder, using his other arm to balance against the door when Nicky's forehead props up against Joe's collarbone, eyeing Joe's hand working between them.

As always, he's far too tight, but he relaxes around the first finger, and then, much slower, around the second. When Joe scissors them, he keens and grunts low in his throat, and Joe wants to bite him, so he does. Serves him right for earlier. But Nicky only mewls and he clenches down almost painfully.

"Enough," Joe mutters, moving away to squeeze more lube into his palm. He drops the tube on top of Nicky's jeans, then takes himself out, stroking gingerly, gasping at the feel of his own palm.

He's about to slick himself up when Nicky says, "Condom." Joe's brain doesn't compute for a long moment. "Always you come a lot," Nicky clarifies, though it doesn't sound like a complaint to Joe's pathetically turned-on brain. Rolling his eyes, it's Nicky who has to crouch down and search his jeans pockets until he victoriously comes up with a foil packet. Joe rolls his eyes right back, unwilling to admit he has a point. He tries not to think what the others might be thinking of their absence. He rolls the condom on and palms himself, making it slick, finally.

Nicky doesn't try to turn around again, simply waits for Joe to move in close and grip his legs. It's likely a stupid idea, Joe hardly about to trust the structural integrity of a pub's bathroom stall door, but Nicky grips at his biceps and lets Joe guide his cock inside, tip breaching him on a low exhale before he's shoving himself inside to the hilt, air leaving the both of them completely when he bottoms out.

The angle is terrible until it isn't. With considerable nimbleness, Nicky braces his shoulders and upper back against the stall door as Joe hitches him up to better hold his thighs in his arms before rocking back and then forward hard enough the door rattles in its hinges alongside the sound of flesh slapping against flesh. Nicky groans and pants, and then they're _off_.

If this were anyone else other than them he could never go this hard, could never fuck in without a single moment's pause. But Nicky lets him, moaning and gripping his cock as if he's missed this just as much, his own hand slipping between them to squeeze at the underside of his own cock, which is leaking into the hem of his shirt, his other hand clutching at the back of Joe's neck, guiding him closer centimetre by centimetre.

Then, face planted into his chest, breathing him in, Joe gets dizzy in a faint sort of way, too hot around the collar, cock seemingly swelling that little bit more. Beneath him, Nicky smells like soap and clean sweat and cheap fabric softener and stale deodorant. Joe's cock twitches and slips out a little, almost all the way out, Nicky's noise of distress echoing in his ears. But immediately he thrusts back in, and it only takes a dozen more strokes inside, his rhythm slipping at the end, before he's coming, pressed in tightly, legs threatening to give out beneath him. They almost do when Nicky finally pulls himself off between them, hole clutching at him over and over again, but he leans them into the door and manages to keep his footing, watching as Nicky comes in streaks up his own stomach and a lot onto his shirt.

*

By the time they clean themselves up as best they can and return to the table, about half a dozen glasses are now littering the middle of it, as well as several plates of half-eaten pub food. Joe's hair is a mess, having been reduced to such a state by Nicky's fingers in the aftermath as they stood kissing for several long minutes Joe can't bring himself to regret. Nicky's shirt is obviously drenched and still vaguely soapy at the edges. No one comments on either.

However, Joe does spot his jacket over the back of his chair. It occurs to him he let it lie in the middle of the bathroom floor after Nicky dragged him off. He sits down without acknowledging its existence. Sitting slumped in the chair across from his, Booker cocks an eyebrow briefly, but he turns to ask Nile if she wants another drink before Joe can even open his mouth.

Next to him, Nicky plays with the rim of his glass. Whatever was in it must be room temperature by now.

This time around, from the other end of the table, it's Quynh who tells the unfunny joke, and Joe listens, laughs in all the wrong places and waits out the afternoon.

**Author's Note:**

> This took an eternity to write, and was maybe a tad self-indulgent, but I have had to drink and it's a Friday night and this is what we do in this household.
> 
> Kudos and comments, as always, greatly appreciated. Writing in this 'verse hurts so good, and I hope you're along on this ride with me. <3
> 
> Tumblr: [rhubarbdreams](https://rhubarbdreams.tumblr.com/)


End file.
